


Shadows Beckon from Dark Doorways | A Wilde Week 2020| Day 4 | Death/Life

by Das_Silberschlussel



Category: Rusty Quill Gaming (Podcast)
Genre: A Wilde Week 2020 (Rusty Quill Gaming), Angst, Day 4 - Death/Life, I'm super proud of this one okay, Illness, Infection, Pandemic - Freeform, Sad, Spoilers for 175, implied suicidal thoughts, no beta we die like bertie, quarantine mention, spoilers for 156
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-21
Updated: 2020-11-21
Packaged: 2021-03-09 22:26:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,633
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27653384
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Das_Silberschlussel/pseuds/Das_Silberschlussel
Summary: Day 4 - “To live is the rarest thing in the world.”Life | DeathA series of vignettes concerning Oscar Wilde and the shades that have followed him throughout most of his career as a meritocratic agent.
Comments: 7
Kudos: 10
Collections: A Wilde Week 2020





	1. Chapter 1

Shades were a constant part of Oscar Wilde's life, even before he had met the London Rangers (We're Still Working On The Name) and their eventual incarnation as the London and Other London Outstanding Mercenary Group. The most prominent of the shades was a sharp female figure with a knife hidden beneath her robes and a smile that could cut just as easily, the second smaller with a wide sharp smile and a quickly drawn bow, both wore the designs of the Cult of Artemis, a symbol that he could only connect physically with those two for the longest time.

But then he had met Sasha, their first meeting had been different than many of his other meetings with prospective teams. He had noticed her hiding in the doorway, generally trying to be unseen – a stark contrast to the way the shade with her form had acted for decades.

Grizzop was also different than the shade that shared his face, though not as clear cut a difference. The physical one was more hardline, and much more reactionary. Wilde hadn't known what to truly expect, and the short time he had been actually at the goblin's mercy – the grace was not something that he had expected from a person that had tempted him with true rest for so long.

The first time that the shade of Sasha had touched him, it was when Grizzop had told him that LOLOMG were heading to Rome. That icy touch itself was like a knife through his veins, a knowledge that nearly brought him to his knees; and that finally opened the door for the Cult of Hades to get their spells fully past his defenses.

He knew when Grizzop left for Rome through the Shades and his dreams.

None of his charges returned and he started to seek out his secondary team to follow the newest lead he had managed through the anti-magic cuffs, though they didn't seem to deter the shades following him.

Zolf, Carter, and Barnes had chosen a run of the mill hotel to serve as their HQ in the newest city. In his naivety he had gone out to try to gather some simple information, to ply his trade as a meritocratic agent and spy. And while the meeting itself had gone well, the shades that escorted him had been nearer, more visible in their actions. They stood in doorways and watched him as he walked, never taking a step themselves.

Once they were hidden behind others huddling for warmth against the rain. The faintest of their symbology of Artemis seen through their dimming translucence. He was shocked, though it would never show on his face, they were so real looking. Even though they had been gone for months to see them as flesh and blood he couldn't stop himself as he moved towards them as they smiled. The smiles, though, were not of happiness, but of pity, and while hope blossomed in his chest, it turned sour as soon as he saw the glint of a knife and crossbow bolt.

Instinctively the magic that was once so near came to his lips, and died there. The shackles that kept the curse at bay, also stripped the magic from his voice, leaving him defenseless to attack.

As he lay beneath the crying sky, he watched as the shades of Sasha and Grizzop moved closer, their hands outstretched to take his own hand from under their reaper's robes. But in a moment their hands stilled as a body fell atop him and was roughly thrown off of him. Warmth pierced through the wet and cold that had begun to seep deeper and deeper into his body.

The soft thrum of words being spoken like a chant began to fill him slowly with warmth, and slowly his hearing came back to hear Zolf's voice finishing a prayer to anyone listening. “I need him as much as this world does. I will fight the gods themselves to save him, he is our only hope. Take what you need from me, only bring him back.”

The cleric had bent over Wilde's body, shielding him from what rain he could, and wiping the blood that was coating his face, in his prayer he could not see the Reaper with Sasha's face nod and smile before leading the cleric's hand to Wilde's gravest wounds and suffusing him with bright light, a taste of divinity and the ability to bring back the near dead for just a moment.

As Zolf poured the extent of his magic, and perhaps part of his soul into Wilde the Reaper smiled once more, the softest of bows as if conceding a point to the other side.


	2. Chapter 2

As much as Wilde hoped, it took less than a week for the shades to return to the periphery of his vision, though if he wasn't looking at Zolf directly, the cleric did tend to have an extra glow about him. With the winter white hair, and the vaguest change to his outlook on life, he seemed to actually repel the shades.

Unfortunately, as much as Wilde might want it, he couldn't keep Zolf with him night and day; he would have to live with the knowledge that without his cleric nearby death was not only coming for him but it was occasionally literally waiting at the doorstep. Still, they had to continue their work, and Barnes and Carter just weren't enough by themselves to get everything done, even if there was only dead ends. Therefore, Zolf would have to go as well.

In his absence, Wilde would fall into melancholy. He would wait near the door, working idly on whatever paperwork he could stomach as the hours slowly dripped by. However, whenever the team returned – whenever Zolf returned – there was something that would always put him on edge. The paranoia of seeing his friend in the flesh when he had been struggling with the ghostly images of the dead and the whispers that there was going to be something wrong about the team when they returned would settle like a cold stone in the pit of his stomach.

He wished he couldn't believe that, but as reports of the infection became more and more urgent, he had to trust his gut and the training he had.

He worked to construct a way to deal with any outsider and anyone he could not personally guarantee the presence of for the past few days: A week long quarantine to wait out the incubation period for the disease. He would use focuses for an anti-magic field, a way to bind those in quarantine away from their magic and any communication possibilities until whatever had run its course. Perhaps this could be a way to save people, or at least reveal the killers' faces beneath the placid human faces they wore.

* * *

The first time Zolf was locked in the cell they had constructed it was difficult for Wilde. He struggled with the paranoia that had been sinking into his bones with every moment. He needed the presence of his cleric, despite the dourness that Zolf brought to the world . He was the only one that kept the shades and whispers away, and they had been growing so very loud in Zolf's absence.

Wilde was ever the loyal agent, and he worked through the rows and rows of scribbled information as he tried to ignore the shade of Sasha that leaned against the wall with a dagger moving deftly in her hands.

The completion of the quarantine led to the most relaxed that Wilde dare let himself feel. A week or two of true respite from the watching shades while he tried to narrow down the newest lead.

* * *

Notification coming from Curie that he was being gifted two recently returned friends got his hackles up. There was nothing good that could truly come out of a message like this; new team members would be barely useful for the team that he ran, and he barely knew if they were truly vetted properly.

“Its Azu and Hamid, Einstein is bringing them now.” She had said at his inquiry and he had dropped a teacup in response. Even though the message was cut off he now had so many questions settling around his shoulders along with the anger of such a sudden revelation and no time to truly process it.

How could Curie be so stupid, they might not actually be Azu or Hamid. For the first time in months he could feel the cold wind that filled the shades as his two constant companions moved closer. And he made decisions that would reveal the two impostors that Curie had sent to his outpost.


	3. Chapter 3

Sending his team to pick up the Alchemist was a choice he had to make.

Azu and Hamid were still on edge around him, and the lingering paranoia he had been feeling with them in the containment cell carried over to the normal days. He found himself snapping at them, at Zolf even more. Perhaps it was jealousy that his cleric had stopped being the anchor that he truly needed to help two others instead.

Considering he had been running background checks as best as he could on the half elf for the better part of a month, it was only reasonable that he added them to the team, if they would agree to it. It would perhaps free up Zolf for his unspoken and (in Wilde's own opinion) more important task of keeping Wilde grounded in the reality of the current situation.

But a week was still to long to be left without someone to help keep the shades at bay.

* * *

The letter coming down from Harlequin HQ was not truly a surprise to him. Technically he had been seeing Sasha for years always looking on with that sharp smile and air of someone with all the time in the world to wait for a misstep. While it had been unnerving at first, through the years he had grown accustomed to the rogue watching, and the minuscule change of expression whenever he took a another metaphorical step towards joining her in her hunt.

But reading her words aloud, knowing that the Sasha when she was alive would have probably never actually written to him like this, cut through the veneer that he maintained as an aloof leader of his agents. Regardless, her shade watched from the corner, nodding along and even mouthing the words, all the while watching him from beneath her reaper's cowl.

When the reading was finished he left to do a second bout of his own silent mourning. This time he didn't see any shades. They had left him alone to his silence and sorrow, perhaps he should take hope in this one moment that they weren't welcoming him to their side of the veil, but there was something truly different about being left alone with his thoughts and questions.

Although the shades rarely responded to the questions he would ask the air, their cold presence had been something of a comfort in the times he was otherwise alone.

The shades would return, they always did.

* * *

Regardless of his search for alternate routes, he stepped aboard Amelia Earhart's recently reconstructed ship, much to the chagrin of its captain. He froze when he noticed the number of shades that were wandering about the decks of the ship, gnomes in reapers cowls still going through their movements like a secondary ghostly crew.

His eyes slid towards Amelia, and her return glance him everything he needed to know. There was kinship between them, two people haunted by death and its subtle thrall.

“I know.” he whispered once in the corridors on the way to the small bunk he had chosen for himself. She had said nothing, but her nod indicated that she had seen his ghosts as well.


	4. Chapter 4

The aurora borealis loomed in the distance when the crew were ushered down into the quarters that Cel and some of the kobolds had managed to make as secure from whatever would happen in the near future. The others turned to games, or perhaps sleep as Wilde slowly watched Amelia's shades start to move things around the ship with increasing tangibility.

His own shades looking on with vague amusement as Cel began to interact with the crewmate manipulating the bucket and rope. Wilde decided to not tell the half-elf what was happening, as they had enough death in their eyes, and didn't need to be able to see the shades as well.

_Let them keep their hope and joy._ He thought as he placed yet another burden on his shoulders.

**S**

The knife that Sasha's shade had been wielding bit into the wood of the deck near Wilde's head. His breath caught for a moment as the next letter followed, each slice drawing his eyes to the shade that was too close and too cold for his comfort.

**O**

Wilde's eyes flicked over to Grizzop's shade who only shrugged in return.

**O**

The scrape of the knife drew his eyes again.

**N**

He could sense the question that she was asking, but for leaving the rain of Japan behind, there was a brighter feeling inside him than the normal gloom and gray that constantly drew him closer to the shades. For once, he hadn't thought of taking the offer from the shades, and with more than one friend he was finally starting to feel grounded.

He shook his head at the shades, making his decision to not join him, despite the rest they truly offered his weary body and soul.

* * *

The denial he had given was the strongest push he could have given, but he knew how death worked, and sometimes it came in the form of a cramp causing the release of a tightly gripped hand on a wheel at the most inopportune moment. Grizzop's red eyes flashed as he lowered the phantom bow and looked across at Wilde, his Reaper's robes were static as the air currents took Wilde into the air.

Wilde opened his mouth to bring magic forth in a way he had once been able, but once again, his instinct failed to recall the cuffs about his ankles.

So Wilde flew

and he flew

and

he

 _fell_.

The wooden spike burst through his chest and a second through his throat. His life ended dashed against the remains of a ship built to take on the dragon he had sworn fealty to.

Wilde felt no pain in this ending, it was like being embraced. In that last moments before his body was pierced he saw Sasha's eyes, her arms outstretched to receive him like a friend she had never truly been in life. She clung to him, and soon Grizzop also followed.

“I'm sorry.” she said in a whisper as they held him. “It wasn't supposed to be like this.”

He almost laughed. There had been so many twist and turns in his life, for the shade that had been so avidly pursuing his passing through the veil to apologize for the moment of his demise. But he felt so much lighter, no pain or the constant weight of the cuffs around his ankles.

Wilde looked at the two shades that had welcomed him in, the tears running down their faces, echoing his own, there had been so much left to do.

“Come on, lets show you what comes next.” Sasha said taking his hand and pulling him forward.

Wilde did not move, instead he turned in the void on this place in the afterlife, a confused look on his face as he watched _his_ cleric beginning to walk after him with eyes closed as if searching by sound.

He opened his mouth and began to sing.


End file.
